A number of containers and complementary penetrable sealing caps have been developed for sealing and selectively dispensing fluids, such as pharmaceuticals and liquid biological specimens. For example, many conventional containers and caps (such as those produced to package pharmaceuticals meant to be injected via needle and syringe) are penetrable self-sealing caps that extend distally into an aperture defined by a vial or other container body such that the cap may guide a needle and/or syringe towards a penetrable portion of the cap that includes, for example, a self-sealing diaphragm that is designed to elastically return to a closed state after being pierced by a syringe or needle extending therefrom. For example, some conventional containers include self-sealing caps with penetrable portions including pre-defined slits or depressions including edges that are designed to return to a closed position after removal of a syringe or other piercing element that may engage the cap to remove products from the container with which the cap is engaged. Other conventional containers require the use of separate sealing liners in conjunction with the cap in order to completely seal a container with a substantially fluid-tight seal.
Furthermore, other conventional containers and sealing caps (such as those produced to package liquid consumer goods) may also include pressure-responsive diaphragms that are designed to respond to pressure differentials between an interior of the container and the ambient environment (due to, for example, transport in an unpressurized aircraft cargo hold). For example, such conventional pressure-responsive containers and caps are designed to plastically deform in response to the pressure differential so as to bulge proximally from the container interior so as to alert a downstream user of the container that the container has experienced a potential breach due to pressure forces.
Such conventional containers and sealing caps may provide re-sealing capabilities and may also provide easily-identifiable indications that the cap has been plastically deformed and that the container has been irreparably breached by a pressure differential between the interior of the container and the ambient environment. However, such conventional containers and caps are not well-suited for providing an elastic deformation in response to an internal pressure build-up that may augment the sealing capacity of the cap. Instead, the conventional containers described above plastically deform and eventually disengage from a sealing engagement with the container in response to a large pressure differential. Furthermore, conventional containers and sealing caps such as the type described generally above may not be well-suited to transfer forces generated by the elastic deformation of a somewhat flexible penetrable portion of the cap so as to augment sealing engagement between the cap and container.
Thus, there is a need in the art for a container and a complementary pressure-responsive cap may generate lateral sealing forces in response to a pressure differential between the exterior and the interior of the container.